Amazingly Epic

Rating: 8/10 (31 July 2000)

If all you're knowledge about D-Day comes from the excellent movie Saving Private Ryan, you should really check out The Longest Day to see the big picture. The two movies aren't comparable. SPR is a close quarters look at how the war effected the soldiers. TLD takes a epic point of view that explores all sides of the invasion. Just compare the way they depicted the landings on the beach. Zanuck's version is a wide camera view of thousands of soldiers running up the beach. Speilberg's focus's on one small stretch of one beach. Anyway, this is the definitive movie of the D-Day invasion, as in the ENTIRE day. SPR is currently the definitive WWII combat movie.
I can't help but warn people that you do need to go into this with the aim of learning about history. It really is a dated movie (hammy/wooden acting, sometimes unbearable low humour, total lack of gore), but this doesn't stop it from delivering a great deal of good info to the watcher.